Feeding the Machine: Sandbagging on Speed Limits

Hoping to hang on to ticket revenue, municipalities flout the law.

Jim Walker admits he was driving faster than the posted 30-mph limit when the cop pulled him over, but he was able to beat the ticket by demonstrating in court that the speed limit, not his driving, was the culprit.

“The judge said he wasn’t happy about it, but he had to throw the ticket out because we proved the speed limit wasn’t legal,” says Walker, 65, of Lexington, Michigan.

Since Congress repealed a national speed-limit law in 1995, states have been increasing limits. So, while state legislatures are voting to up speed limits, local municipalities are reluctant to follow, experts say, because they don’t want to lose the revenue that speeding tickets provide.

In Michigan, most towns have not complied with a four-year-old state law ordering them to reset speed limits according to specific formulas, says one of the state’s top traffic cops. Lt. Gary Megge, head of the Michigan State Police Traffic Services Section, says one of the reasons for this inaction is the revenue raised by those tickets.

“I think money is part of it, and I find it reprehensible that communities aren’t following the law,” Megge says. “In many cases, the problem is the speed limit, not the motorist. Communities have to obey the law, too.”

The state law, Public Act 85 of 2006, compels communities to set limits based on the speed at which 85 percent of drivers are traveling at the time a study is conducted. Limits are also based on the number of driveways or cross streets that intersect a given stretch of road.

If either of those two methods is not used, a 55-mph limit applies by default, except in some cases such as subdivisions or business districts. But because most communities in Michigan have not complied, speed limits throughout the state remain “artificially low,” according to Megge.

“If you’re driving down a road, and it just feels like the speed limit is way too low, it probably is,” Megge says.

The fault, Megge explains, lies with elected officials, not cops. “People don’t become police officers because they want to give out tickets to people who are driving safely,” he adds.

There are glimmers of revolt. After Walker won his case in 2008, he helped another driver get a citation thrown out using the same argument.

“The city appealed, but the judge dismissed the appeal,” Walker says. “He came out and told me he didn’t want to dismiss it, but he had no choice—it was the law.”

Steve Purdy, director of the National Motorists Association’s Michigan chapter, says prosecutors usually will dismiss tickets challenged under PA 85. “They don’t want to establish a precedent, so they’ll throw out the ticket,” he explains.

And county road commissions in the state of Michigan, which do not collect ­revenue from speeding tickets, have been more inclined than municipalities to comply with PA 85 on the roadways under their ­jurisdictions, according to Megge.

Chris Florka, a traffic design technician for the Macomb County Road Commission, which recently increased some speed limits after conducting speed studies in accord­ance with the state law, says the cost of complying with PA 85 is minimal.

“It’s just a matter of having your employees go out and conduct the study,” says Florka, who opted to set limits by having a road commission employee gauge traffic speeds with a radar gun.

Michael Kitchen, the police chief of Ferndale, a Detroit suburb, admits the need for revenue was the reason behind his recent decision to step up traffic enforcement. “We have to write more tickets in order to avoid layoffs,” Kitchen says. “I don’t like how this looks to the public at all, but the bottom line is: If you obey the speed limit, we won’t give you a ticket.”

However, Kitchen also admits that the 35-mph speed limit on the most heavily driven roadway in Ferndale is likely too low. “That speed limit would probably be 45 mph if they ever did a speed study,” he says.

State police cannot force communities to comply with the public act, according to Megge.

“If a speed limit hasn’t been set properly and someone exceeds it, the driver is in violation of the number on the sign,” Megge says. “But if they’re driving at a speed that’s realistic, do they deserve a $200 fine? Personally, I say they do not. I know if I got a ticket on a road where the speed limit wasn’t set properly, I’d fight it.”